Tru melee hopium/copium is dead

i remember how i was hyped for poe2 and how jonathan sold the idea that a large portion of why they needed to separate poe1 from 2 is because 2 was more focused on designing the game around melee balance.

in poe2 melee is rough in the campaign. but when you get better gear. even when its underpowered (maces) compared to other builds. i honestly felt satisfied dancing around the bosses. hacking them down. i was "kiting" bosses where i would smack them with my mace, when they wanted to attack i would roll out of the way. it was very skill based and deliberate.

balbala is my favourite boss in poe2. shes just awesome. she can wreck you very easily, but with enough understanding, i can smack her with my mace and avoid most if not all her attacks. many bosses are the same where you can kill them using trumelee.

i havent touched the game for months. but i do stalk the subreddit. some dude recently posted a vid of him enjoying melee where he's somehow having a lot of firey aoes. his attacks are aoe. everythings aoe.

a friend of mine showed another yt vid where it had a compilation of streamers deleting bosses using op builds.

all i see is ggg giving up on deliberate gameplay. they nerfed a lot of things but they didnt nerf enough.

i do know that trumelee will ALWAYS be at disadvantage in d-likes. aoes and projectiles will always have an edge. but from how its going. tru melee might as well be dead and deleted from poe. poe2 is turning into another poe1.

i m glad that if you're having fun with either poe1/2. i m happy for you. as for me. all i get is reaffirmation that this game is not for me.

NRFTW, TQ1/2, GD seem to let me have a better trumelee experience. i have lost whatever shred of hopium towards GGG in this regard. its ironic. in poe1 they removed totems, mainly because of the totem buff, ignoring the fact that totems are super strong. a friend of mine switched out his main melee skill with a totem skill gem. all the supports were the same. he turned into a totem user. it was simply much better to let your totem do the fighting for you. by removing the totem, it forced melee players to actually rely on their own character to do damage (in most cases). i find it mind boggling that in poe2 they added totem back in.

we can play passively using a totem. we can play passively using warcries to damage enemies. warriors can literally cry so much that bosses die.

anyway. thanks for reading my rant.